


Joy to the World

by HissHex



Series: NaNoWriMo 2020 - A TMA Collection [26]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Gen, martin's mother is the content warning here guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:27:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27723475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HissHex/pseuds/HissHex
Summary: The last Christmas with his mother before Martin applies for the Magnus Institute.
Series: NaNoWriMo 2020 - A TMA Collection [26]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1995427
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	Joy to the World

Martin muffled his groan as he got home from work, so as to not wake his mum, leaning against the wall and stretching his tired muscles.

His job at the corner shop hadn’t been open for Christmas, thankfully, but the night shift at the supermarket had still called him in on Christmas Eve, he was the only one who agreed to show up, everyone else insisted they were ill. Martin couldn’t afford to miss out on the chance for a pay check, even if he had been ill.

Shuffling to his bedroom, Martin undressed hurriedly before flopping down into his bed, exhausted.

He cursed as his alarm went off 3 hours later.  


He forced his tired muscles to lever himself out of bed and to get dressed, again. His fingers shook slightly as he blearily fumbled with the tie around his neck. Giving up on the tie being perfect as a lost cause, he moved to his mum's room to help get her ready for church. She was as difficult as usual, snapping at him for everything under the sun. She scolded him for the tie, for dressing her too slowly, for looking tired. Martin just nodded along, too tired and too used to this treatment from his mum to bother arguing back.

She always preferred to walk to church. This wouldn't be a problem in Martin's eyes but she would always get more and more irritable as she tired of walking.

The morning air was brisk as they walked and Martin's coat was doing nothing for the chill, leaving him shivering in the aura of his mother's indifference. She turned into a completely different woman once they arrived at the church. Their previous cold silence shifting like sand into a friendly woman that was practically a stranger to Martin. She smiled and laughed with the other older ladies at the church, leaving Martin to awkwardly hover behind her.

He let out a cold breath once they entered the church, it was no warmer in here and he tugged his jacket closer around himself.

Once the service started, Martin found himself slipping, exhaustion and sheer disinterest warring with anxiety until his head eventually dropped back slightly and he closed his eyes. He was lucky that he didn't snore, it let him catch a few winks of sleep at work on his breaks and it let him sleep lightly in the freezing church.

He felt a sharp pain in his side that jerked him awake. His mum glared down at him and he stumbled to his feet to sing, body swaying as it tried to lull him back to sleep.

Martin left the church happily enough, ready to properly sleep off his last work shift. Another hour of listening to his mother gossip. One of the ladies who had a soft spot for him passed over a Tupperware. The leftovers from her own Christmas dinner from a few days back, her husband was a doctor and couldn't actually get Christmas off so they had it a little early. She smiled and patted him on the back when he insisted that it was too kind of her. He could have kissed her to be honest, not having to cook anything when he got back meant he could go to bed so much sooner and he couldn’t deny that this was a much better meal than whatever he managed to string together from whatever they had in the cupboard. He gave her a brief hug before his mum called him over and they headed home.

After that, the day was like any other, his mother spat out the roast dinner and shouted at him for a bit before retreating to her own room. Her complaints were nothing new, accusations of laziness and not caring about her before she stormed out. Martin felt bad as he picked at his own dinner, it tasted lovely, but his mum's barbed insults always made it hard to enjoy anything.

He had finally managed to get into bed when the phone rang, his mum shouted and he groaned as he stumbled to his feet.

It was the supermarket, he was being laid off, they didn't need him anymore. He kept his voice polite, no need to burn any bridges after all, but had to place a hand over his mouth to muffle his cries once he hung up the phone. 

He considered his patchy CV, maybe altering it a little couldn't hurt, maybe he could get something a little better paying. Something that meant he could afford to put his mother up in a home. He was sure he could pretend he knew what he was doing long enough to get a hang of it. Some kind of library job perhaps, he could do that surely?   
He vowed to get on it when he woke up, moments before his eyes slipped closed into a dreamless sleep. 

  
  



End file.
